Tom Wade, teacher and youth worker:
“My first teaching post was in a faith school and I really appreciated the way faith was weaved in through staff prayers, daily chapel services and a growing student Christian union. However, working in a secular school has also shown me a richer and more rewarding experience of working with young people. With only a small percentage of adults in England now attending church there is no way that a faith school can serve the whole community and their diverse religious needs. Nor do these schools respect the autonomy of young people in the vital matter of choosing their own religious views. There is no doubt in my mind that faith schools can be a positive educational experience but there is a real danger in their foundations of how they are set up, what curriculum is offered, and having a student body that is representative of the community it is meant to serve. I’m not sure that in a society where acceptance and tolerance are taught as key virtues, we should be denying young people an education because of the faith of their parents.”
Jack Regan, Catholic youth worker:
“A lot of different faith communities have entered into partnership with the government to run schools: an arrangement dating back to Victorian times, when the Government decided to get serious about statutory education and realised it had to do so with some deference to the communities who had already been providing education for some time. These days, faith schools are very mixed. Some are very intentional about evangelising, and successful in doing so. Others are very faith schools much in name only, maintaining a ‘faith foundation’ which has little impact on how they operate. The vast majority are somewhere on a spectrum in between. In my career, I’ve been lucky enough to work with some fantastic faith schools, and I’m in no doubt whatsoever: the good ones really can make a difference.”
